I think that the calico critters is a great ideal, that's what I had as a kid and I loved them!!! you could let your kids make their own clothes pin people.

My daughter has never been terribly interested in the people dolls that came with her dollhouse they are like these

http://www.amazon.com/Plan-Modern-Doll-Family-7142/dp/B000FZNEJE

but has used her Calico Critters and the Plan Toys' pets set the most. Chances are whatever you get your daughters will probably find a more preferred toy to use so I wouldn't sweat trying to find the perfect family too much and let them have a say in maybe replacing the original family when they get older.

Melissa & Doug have some cute families and Lakeshore too. On a side note, really take a good look at the dollhouse before you purchase one. Get one that's nice and open with easy access to each room. Some of these more modern dollhouse's aren't like that....we learned that the hard & expensive way. Good luck!

Calico Critters is a great idea. We started our daughter with those when she was 3. At 6 they are still some of her most played with toys.

I have to jump on the CALICO CRITTERS bandwagon!! My daughter infinitely prefers animal toys to people toys. We have a few Calico families living in our dollhouse, so we named her dollhouse 'The Calico Critter Hotel', you can check it out here: http://www.juliasbookbag.com/2011/07/calico-critter-hotel.html

I don't think my dollhouse growing up even had people - it was all about the decorating! But my best friend had three (!) fabulous dollhouses, and she had little people her mother made. Basically, the body structure was like a rag doll, with yarn hair (the grandmother had a bun, the little girl a ponytail). But inside the rag doll body were pipecleaners, so the dolls could be posed. They also had little outfits, simple, but nice. I loved them. Wouldn't be hard to make, if you know how to sew, or you might put up a request on Etsy.

Most dollhouse people are just sad, sad, sad-looking.

One of our local natural toy stores stocks Waldorf toys including the dolls from Kathy Kruse. And oh, are they so sweet. I ended up splurging on a couple and they are really nice. And they stand up to play. Yes, handmade of natural materials (wool, cotton) in Germany and expensive. But my kids really love them, they really stand/move well, and it ended up being a reasonable price for their play value. And even my 2 year old can be gentle with them.

Magic Cabin has the largest selection of different styles. I'd suggest ordering them and taking a look before you totally make up your mind. How many dolls do you really need?

You could also get the dollhouse and just see who moves in. We have the Stackhouse, featured here, and it has a great design. Dinosaurs lived there for about year before we get people.

Ok, I should add that my daughter has a few doll houses and we buy the small strawberry shortcake dolls & Olivia & Angelina Ballerina figures from the toy store...also, those small Disney princess figures are a hit as well!

Ah, yes. I've got a bit of a twist on this one; apart from appearance. If your kids are adamant about removing clothes (like a lot of kids that age), I recommend the dolls from Nova Naturals - they can be dressed/undressed, the only ones in the universe I could find, but quite pricey. The ones with glued-on clothes cause a lot of frustration and inadvertent damage to the doll (Pottery Barn or Plan Toys for example).

I think Playmobil dolls might be a good way to go in retrospect, my daughter has a few random figures from sets that she plays with all the time because they match her skills (and no clothes issues). The little Calico Critters are her favorite thing to visit at the toy store, they are very cute indeed and you wouldn't be going wrong really, plus they are relatively cheap, but they were overly plasticky-fragile for me.

This is an aside, but it turns out the real cool thing with dollhouses is the FURNITURE (and dolls). If you watch kids playing in a store where the dollhouse is on a table, you'll see they pull the furniture out and play with it OUT of the house. Eventually, we put our dollhouse in the attic and she plays with the furniture all the time. You could actually not get the dollhouse at all. I know, it feels totally wrong, but it's one of those pieces of advice worth giving and ignoring ;)

Definitely get them a cat or dog 'pet' for their house, for sure. And a baby with a crib, those are the items that get played with most.

Good luck!

Playmobil people are great for doll houses. You can get such a variety of different people and they have all sorts of tiny accessories (hats, necklaces, back packs) to add as your child grows to keep them interested.

I've always liked the Sylvanian Family sets for doll houses... but I think most doll house *people* are creepy. Little animals in people clothes are okay though, haha.

http://www.sylvanianfamilies.com/index.php?cPath=21&osCsid=8fd77c2a5ad2eeb8635d307f1f0dc5ca

Oh! I didn't read the comments before me! Calico Critters and Sylvanian Families are the same thing! I had them growing up and forgot about them.. and saw them on a trip to Japan (where I bought several sets). :P

I have to jump back into this conversation and second the suggestion for Kathe Kruse dolls and say hurray for Magic Cabin. They have awesome stuff in general, it's hands down one of my top likes for All Things Kid Fabulous. Kathe Kruse dolls are pricy, but they are beyond adorable and they are fabulously well made, quality items!

My daughter is almost 4 and we bought her the Calico Critter house when she was 2. I really wanted to buy her the Plan Toy Modern house (mostly for my aesthetics) but she would always head to the Calico Critter's house at the toy store near us. I would try many times to have her "play" with the wooden one but just didn't like the furniture. It was bulky and not "real" looking. The Calico Critters have some amazing looking furniture sets that are too cute not to play with them. Unfortunately, it comes with the most tiniest accessories which I have packed away for when she is old enough to play with. I also bought her some Critters to go with the house. She has not touched them till this day. She loves using her Disney princesses, random figurines, old Little People pieces, etc. Your girls will use anything in their dollhouse so it doesn't have to be perfect. So long there are some furniture pieces they will be happy. You can always add more pieces later.

When I was little I was never able to find the right sized dolls for my beautiful little doll house!

I did a quick search for "dollhouse dolls" on etsy.com and there were several different styles. Some were reasonably priced, some were pretty expensive but there are plenty of "waldorf inspired" dolls out there.

I would stick with figurines that are small and simple for now (like Calico Critters) and move on to more realistic people as your girls get older. I got a dollhouse as a toddler that I loved and when I got to be about 9 or 10, a friend of the family built me a gorgeous Victorian dollhouse and collecting beautiful, detailed figurines and furniture for it was a hobby until I was a teenager. A dollhouse is something that can really grow with a child but the style of furniture/people in it can mature as the child grows.

My daughter loves this family of cats by French toymaker Vilac. They're beautifully made in bright lacquered colors, with poseable limbs and changes of clothes, and they come in this great wood box with a clear plastic cover for storage. http://www.unicahome.com/p19321/vilac/leon-the-kittens-family-by-vilac.html.

Ooh, that dollhouse is awesome! I've been wanting to get a dollhouse for my son who will be 2 in a few weeks but was worried he might still be too young. I was thinking it could grow with him and he could play with his smaller action figures and Playmobile dolls in it and use it as a 'base' and eventually Lego minifigures when he is old enough.

Thanks, everyone. This is super helpful. I am leaning toward the Calico Critters route, but now I'm trying to decide if I should be thinking of this in terms of phases (a "starter" dollhouse now, and a nicer, more detailed house--and figures--down the road), or if I am going to try to find one set that will last for the long haul.

Thanks again
Tara

I second readers' suggestions of Playmobil, Calico Critters, or other high quality non-dollhouse dolls, particularly while they're young. These pocket dolls are also great. In a few years, the more expensive dolls might be a worthwhile investment! I still have my halfpenny dollhouse family, which survived about seven years of hard play and suitcase travel, waiting for my child. (Incidentally, why did Hearthsong stop selling halfpenny dolls??) Evi dolls aren't exactly cheap, but at $75 for a set of 7 they are less expensive than the Kathy Kruse dolls.

:) my doll house was the BEST present ever!! we're finnish, so naturally we have a sauna... when i was 6 or 7, for some reason i wasn't allowed to go sauna (during nov-dec.)! well, christmas eve came around, and there was one more present left... it was big and it was hiding under my mom's robe on the table... for me?! it was a doll house!! my dad had made it himself, secretly in the sauna :) my mom painted it and wallpapered it. i only ever had calico critters- played out all kinds of story lines with them (my mom always seemed to laugh at the one about the "highschool drop out bunny"!)... we collected and made furniture for it throughout the years, and the critters are still in mint condition... and it all started 20 years ago! (i'm 26 now) i have a 4 month old daughter of my own now, and i'll be happy to let her play with the doll house at her mamma and pappa's ;)

we went with calico critters this past xmas. Big hit, until mawmaw sent over some tiny oz, strawberry shortcake, and Disney princess dolls from (I think) fast food kid meals. The panda family gets no love now.
go with whatever your daughters like now that is the right size for the house and furniture, anything beyond that doesn't really matter, and will probably be replaced by them first chance.

A related question: I'm searching for an appropriate doll family for the larger sized houses that accommodate up to 12" dolls. And I don't want to get Barbies, Disney princess dolls, Bratz etc. The traditional-sized doll families are scaled around 5" or so and are too little. Any suggestions?

I had a dollhouse growing up that was about 1:12 scale and it was populated by vintage Topper Dawn dolls. They were sort of like mini Barbies and came with tons of tiny clothes. They are probably best for older kids though, about 8 and up.

We use Calico Critters for my son and daughter. The animals have the advantage of being more gender neutral as well.

I would check etsy for custom dolls, though, if you want a certain type of human doll.

We have the plan toys family that goes with our dollhouse.

I used a petite blythe doll for my daughters dollhouse. I think her scale could work nicely for several dollhouses. here is my 5 year old's dollhouse:

http://lavitapetite.wordpress.com/category/la-petite-maison/

the pioneer woman posted about some plastic people that she bought and loved. check them out

http://thepioneerwoman.com/homeschooling/2009/12/diversity-my-approach/

My daughters have the Plan Toys dollhouse families and Calico Critters, but the ones they love and play with the most are their Budkins dolls! http://www.budkins.com/home.html

They're from the UK, but you can find some of them on Amazon.

for EllaT: have you only looked at wood and plastic dolls? You might try looking at soft dolls, they seem to come in a greater range of sizes. An added plus would be that they bend in all the right places. My daughter has entered a nitpicky phase and complains that her dolls don't bend at the knees and can't sit close enough to the table to eat right.

Miniatures.com has lots of styles of doll families, and a number of them are poseable. That's where I would start looking. Good luck!

I see that this is an old post,but anh...I'll put in my 2 cents. I have three daughters who are now 11, 9 and 6. I have tried any imaginable combination of dollhouse/ doll combos. I love natural and minimalist and we had a collection of le van wooden dolls. I said had because I played with them more than they did. We also don't have a dollhouse anymore. They have always loved and still even do...taking the furniture out and creating a space for whatever...even pen caps. Open-endedness is key for long-lasting toys. The only ones that seem to pass this test are LEGOS and Playmobil. And paper and crayons for that matter. I wish I knew this a long time ago. I would have put all of that toy money into their college funds!